Blog Archives

It may not be the world’s most exciting meal, but it’s classic Chez Sheetar comfort food – meat and potatoes. It was a quick and easy meal to make in the oven in one pan, and I get to show off the peach jam I made! Our single little peach tree yielded quite the harvest this year, so I was able to do two batches of jam, a run of canned peaches, and even froze two bags of skinned and pitted peaches for pies over the winter. Of course, the squirrels got a fair share of the peaches too, but it’s no big deal since there were SO many. Anyway, the meal is kielbasa with potatoes plus a small salad and some cheese and jam. The cheese is Birchrun Hills’ Red Cat that was washed in Tired Hands beer and it was OH SO DELICIOUS with the jam. It actually made for a nice little dessert!

Yep, still playing catch-up. It should be week 15 as I’m posting this, so I’m still behind. Life just keeps getting away from me and the first thing to go when things get to be too much is cooking. But hey, I’m still here making the effort, and I have to wonder if I’d even bother cooking at all if it weren’t for this challenge! So, this meal was a ham steak with grilled onions and eggplant and a cucumber and tomato salad on the side. Everything was cooked on the grill, so it was great to not have to heat up the house on a day that was already too hot to begin with! I may have ever so slightly overcooked the ham steak, but it was still delicious since it was given a little rub down with our own honey before it was introduced to the grill. I need to remind myself that I don’t have to be fancy, and it’s okay to slap meat and veggies on the grill and thats good enough (and better than a microwaved boxed dinner).

Still playing catch-up, but here’s One Local Summer week 10! I had originally looked up recipes for Polenta Pizza, and came up with a recipe that had that name, but it much more resembles cornbread pizza than polenta pizza. I figure once you add anything other than water and butter/oil to cornmeal, especially when the extra ingredients are flour and baking powder, it ends up being cornbread and not polenta. Still, for cornbread pizza done in the cast iron skillet, this was pretty decent! I think the blue cheese and chorizo actually worked out well with the cornbread base so it wasn’t a traditional pizza on top of cornbread. The quick jolt near the end of cooking under the broiler was really key to really bubble the cheese on top, and the crust ended up with a nice, crunchy bottom (not burnt, just nicely well-baked). The leftovers are even good!

The recipe came from here (http://www.simplehealthykitchen.com/skillet-margarita-polenta-pizza/) and let’s forgive them for the misspelling of Margherita because even though the recipe was a little misleading, it was still good and cooked up as specified!

Husband has returned home and cooked up this classic summer meal – a pulled pork sandwich. A good part of this one was a long time in the making. The sauerkraut was made months ago, fermented from fresh cabbage in a huge stoneware crock. The pickles were started a month ago and came out as terrific sour pickles. The buns were made last year and pulled from the freezer. The cider in the glass was also made last year and was just kegged and ready to drink this past month. The only thing new on the plate is the pulled pork which cooked up in the crock pot all day with some cider, peppers, onion, vinegar, and tomatoes, and came out DELICIOUS.

Winding down to the end of One Local Summer with just a few weeks left of our set. Usually we drag this out through November, but we’re taking a break and wrapping it up soon. At the top of the meal, we have a bowl filled with all sorts of tomatoes, drizzled with some balsamic vinegar and topped with basil. Next around is a mug of homebrewed beer. The on the main plate is zucchini, sweet potatoes, lamb sausage, and banana peppers stuffed with blue cheese and wrapped in bison bacon. This meal involved a good bit of prep work, but once everything was cut and wrapped and ready, it all went onto the grill (except the tomatoes). Pretty easy! The lamb sausage was absolutely delicious and I’m glad I sprung for it at the market. The whole thing together made for a great dinner.